1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the art of scaffolding and, in particular, to means providing a fall safety rail on the top most level of scaffolding prior to complete assembly of and after complete disassembly of that level.
2. The Prior Art
In typical scaffold constructions, two spaced apart upright members are secured in proper upright position on base members and held in place by side cross braces. Guard rails are attached between the uprights on the outward side of the scaffolding, the side away from a building. Floor boards are extended between the uprights so that workmen can stand on and work on the stable, elevated temporary flooring. However, it has been found that workers can, for one reason or another, fall through unprotected spaces between the floor, cross braces, and uprights. For this reason OSHA, a federal regulatory and safety agency has imposed many regulations on the industry to require suitable fall protection on the scaffolding. While it is fairly easy to hang guard rails on erected portions of scaffolding, it is practically impossible to provide guard rails on the next uppermost level to be erected with the structures and equipment currently available in the industry.
A typical state of the art scaffolding assembly is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,782,914. Construction scaffolding of this type is standardized in the industry and comprises pairs of laterally spaced apart inverted U-shaped uprights each having a work facing rear side and an outwardly facing front side. The uprights are secured in an upstanding position by cross brace assemblies interconnecting the pairs of uprights on both the front and rear sides. Floor boards, which are either wooden or metal planks, are secured between the uprights to provide a temporary walking and standing platform.
Building scaffolding has long been considered to be a hazardous occupation and many safety devices have been proposed to assure that workmen will not fall from the scaffolding. There is, however, an inherent problem in building scaffolding in how to provide fall prevention means at the top of scaffolding before the workmen get up on that level to complete the assembly thereof
The most often proposed solution to this problem is to provide safety harnesses for the workmen. But this raises the problem of what to attach the safety harness to. Generally such harnesses are attached to something above the workmen so as to limit the distance they may fall. However, if there is no structure adjacent to the scaffolding, then this is not a viable solution. This leaves only the possibility of tieing to the scaffolding. This, however, is not a good solution since a falling workman would build up significant velocity in falling, prior to being restrained, and this would cause problems in arresting the fall. Further, a workman would not be likely to fall straight down off the edge of the scaffolding but fall outward away from the scaffolding. This would create components of force perpendicular to the vertical surface of the scaffolding, tending to pull the scaffolding down, as well as causing the workman to swing into the scaffolding at the end of this fall, possibly causing further injury by contact with the scaffolding.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,867,997 discloses a guard rail support assembly which is attached beneath a scaffolding platform. One end of the assembly extends beyond the lateral edge of the platform and has an upright post pivotally attached thereto. When the assembly is positions on the platform, the upright post is rotated to an upright position, locked in place, and guard rail suspended therefrom.
The present invention proposes a solution to this problem by providing a temporary guard rail assembly which can be erected from below to provide a guard rail already in place before a workman rises to the uppermost level to complete the scaffolding.
The present invention relates to temporary guard rails used, for example, in scaffolding in the construction industry, and more particularly to a temporary guard rail assembly which can be elevated to and secured above the upper most level of scaffolding prior to assembly of the scaffolding at that level. In a similar fashion, the subject temporary guard rail assembly would be the last portions of scaffolding removed as the scaffolding is disassembled, and the removal of this temporary guard rail would be accomplished from the next successive lower level.